


the tomorrow we named

by isshun



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: M/M, Reincarnation!AU, but endgame is still kisekasa, slight aokise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-04
Updated: 2014-04-04
Packaged: 2018-01-18 04:12:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1414624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isshun/pseuds/isshun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They meet by the sidewalk of a cafe in Shinjuku. The rest is history.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the tomorrow we named

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, The Time Traveller's Wife and anything else recognisable.

●

 

_I have looked at you_   
_in millions of ways and_   
_I have loved you in each_   
_-lordoftheconquistador_

 

●

 

 

The first time Kasamatsu Yukio remembers Kise Ryouta, the world is drenched in red. Blood red. And his eyes hurt. With each blink, his eyes sting like a fucking bee but the pain is nothing compared to the pressure of the pistol pressed against his temple, threatening to pump his brains with silver lead until they fly out and splatter artistically across the dingy alley of Shinjuku in the dead of the night.

“I know you have the password.” Kise’s voice, dripping with sweet, honeyed venom, breathes against his ear.

Kasamatsu grunts. He closes his eyes for a second and imagines greener pastures where the sun sets in the west and a job that doesn’t require daily weapon exchanges and the constant fear of death by assassination. His parents appear in his dream too (somewhere). Silently, Kasamatsu says a prayer to the gods he never believed in and hopes they continue living the life he will never have.

But there are more urgent matters at hand now. Like Kise’s fingers wrapped around his bloodstained tunic and the tiny voice in his head whispering _goodbye goodbye goodbye._

The light at the end of the tunnel grows brighter, and Kise’s whispers fade into the background where they are meant to be. Kasamatsu’s grip on his gun goes slack and it’s only a matter of time before his heart calls it quits.

“Akashicchi would not be pleased with you,” ocher-yellow eyes stare down at his pathetic, dying self. Kasamatsu remembers them. Those eyes. They used to be warm, filled with laughter and a glint of amusement that took his breath away until Kise turned his back on them, on _him_ and pointed a gun at his colleagues and shot them dead without batting an eye.

So much for trust and sincerity. Maybe Boss Takeuchi should revise the oath every hitman pledges when they decide to dedicate their worthless lives to Kaijou Ltd.

But Kasamatsu still forgives Kise, still forgives the naive young man who joined Kaijou out of the blue and accidentally socked his senpai in the gut on his first day, who always went down the wrong path during secret missions and needed his senpai to save his ass. The blond has built a home in Kasamatsu’s heart and no matter how much Kasamatsu tries to hate him for the untimely betrayal, he is reminded of soft touches and passionate kisses in the dead of the night fueled by quiet whispers of _‘i love you’_ s tattooed into pale, sweaty skins.

“Tell me what’s the password and I will let you go, senpai.”

_Kise,_ Kasamatsu tries to say and hold that trembling hand gripping his shirt to chase away his fears and tell him it’s okay and that he forgives him (Kise was always a coward, only reliable when someone got hurt or died), but the spark in him has long burned out. His time is up. So, he keeps quiet and lets Kise light him up like a raging bonfire one last time before he goes out with a bang.

 

 

●

 

 

In every world Kasamatsu remembers being dumped unceremoniously into, Kise has always found his way back to him. It’s funny because every time he sees a mop of blond hair on the streets, something eggs at Kasamatsu’s heart to stop whatever he’s doing and march over to demand a name.

But the Kasamatsu Yukios in the next few lives are much more cautious. In their second life together that he remembers, he entirely avoids socialising with the blond kid next door like the plague and spends his life building his reputation as Shittiest Neighbour of Kaijou Town. In the third, he becomes a sailor who leaves behind his family and dies in the war against the Teikou nation, not knowing that the one who pulled the trigger was the famous blond sharpshooter known for his terrifying accuracy. He felt a creepy sense of deja vu in his last moments then, but that was all before his body sunk into the depths of the freezing sea.

The fourth is what sets things rolling. This time, Kasamatsu is blessed with a ditzy younger sister he always has to look out for, long pale legs a magnet for lecherous boys whose pubes and hormonal urges get the better of them every single damned day (like his bastard of a best friend Moriyama). He is also blessed with a sense of kinship so strong for his kawaii little Yukiko-chan he can’t help but submit to her insane requests every time she holds his hand and looks at him, her large blue-grey eyes a stunning mirror image of his.

“What is it this time.” Kasamatsu sighs exasperatedly as he tucks his very sick-looking sister back into bed.

She points at the life-sized cardboard standee of superstar Kise Ryouta by the door and bestows a pristine limited edition CD album upon his lap.

“You have to go to the fansign for me.” she hides half her face with her Kise Ryouta-printed handkerchief (which probably costed her an arm and leg. And her sanity).

Kasamatsu splutters in protest. “What?! NO. Me, go to a fansign where rabid fangirls like you roam the streets and terrorise innocent bystanders? Never.” Yukiko-chan is a lot of things to him but not enough for him to sacrifice his sanity to the gods of destruction and chaos.

“But I spent a lot of money just to get into this fansign! I had to buy more than twenty albums to dump all the fansign application forms into the box and–”

“No.”

_“_ _Oni-chaaaaaaan–”_

“Stop that, Yukiko. You’re already 16 for heaven’s sake.”

“Fine,” she sits up and gets out of bed, “I’ll just go myself even though it’s winter and I’m down with the flu–”

“Okay okay I’ll go! Just tell me the time and place so I can get out as soon as possible!”

But if Kasamatsu thinks the devious grin his sister sent him was hell, he’s dead wrong. Three hours later in the peak of the winter season, he is still standing behind 100 insane girls and among another 200-ish screaming and cooing at their beloved _Ryouta-sama!!_ and singing their praises to the high heavens where their souls have left for. His legs have died from the numbing cold and he figures it’s only a matter of time before his frozen fingers start dropping off one by one into the snow.

Teenage sensation pop idol Kise Ryouta sits alone behind ten rows of railings, security flocking by his side to keep the fangirls at bay. Kasamatsu is one of the only two boys in the crowd, and perhaps the only one who still has his sanity intact. He scowls in disgust when the blond blows a kiss to the crowd on his right, and resists the urge to gag in broad daylight when Kise winks at the crowd of girls on the left who swoon and scream in response.

Yup, that’s teenage superstardom for you, Kasamatsu groans inwardly. He’s gotten used to the pokes and stares from the fangirls who seem to want to dissect him for further inspection, but he hasn’t gotten used to all the disgusting fanservice that’s supposed to make the hearts of young girls melt into goo.

Perhaps dispensing fake smiles and perfect signatures were a part of Kise’s training, but Kasamatsu still can’t believe that aspiring youths actually sign themselves up for this. It’s torturous. It’s hell. High-pitched screams are detrimental to his hearing and health. Just two hours into this fansign have taught him to never ever come back even if it means sacrificing his sister to the land of no turnbacks.

“Number 74,” security at the other end of the line checks his badge number, gives him one hard, long look before pushing him forward.

Kise Ryouta takes a glimpse of his next fan and Kasamatsu notices the blond’s eyebrows shooting up in surprise before he schools his expression into one of professional cheerfulness.

Ugh. He’s emitting too much light. It’s too blinding to even look at.

“Konnichiwa!” Kise chirps at him from his seat, cheeks tinged pink from the cold and takes the album from Kasamatsu’s frozen fingers. He smells heavily of cherry blossom body foam and lavender deodorant. And it must be the effect of those two scents because suddenly, Kasamatsu’s heart is fluttering and going into palpitations when Kise smiles brightly at him and looks at him with warm, honey-golden eyes.

“How rare to see a fanboy! Your name, please?”

"Yukiko," and he belatedly realises that's not his name and Kise is blinking at him so he blurts out the next thing on his mind, "I mean– my name is Yukio but it's for my sister! She’s sick so I came in her place!"

"Ah, I see." Kise smiles politely and signs an extra ‘get well soon’ behind a messy scrawl of ‘Yukiko’. "How nice of you. I wish I had a brother like you to stand in the cold for me."

"Only child?"

Kise pauses, sharpie hovering above the album until Kasamatsu's expectant stares shock him back to the present.

"You know, people never ask me that because it's firsthand information they obtain when they look up my profile and dig up my private family photos on the internet," he grins evilly, “they usually ask if I have a girlfriend, or if I’d like to have sex with them before shoving me their numbers and leaving in a fluster and giggles.”

"Brat." Kasamatsu takes his changing opinion of the idol back. Kise Ryouta is the embodiment of evil and his fangirls are all spawns of satan.

But then, Kise lowers his head and smiles again, albeit a different one this time, "But yeah, I live alone," he says, “it gets kind of lonely sometimes." he adds quietly.

Oh shit, what is Kasamatsu supposed to say now? No one's ever prepared him to deal with situations that require empathy with someone he’s just met two minutes ago oh god he’s gonna die Kasamatsu is going to be stoned to death by that horde of evil fangirls glaring down his back and he won’t make it out alive oh no oh crap–

Before he can spit out some words of comfort, Kise Ryouta is handing him back the album and a complimentary fashion magazine while staring at him with those bright, hypnotising eyes again.

There is something about those eyes that stimulates his heart to beat faster. They seem so familiar, so close to home that Kasamatsu can't help but continue but stare back even as security pushes him along the line of exiting fangirls.

"See you." Kise says wistfully, even though they will probably never meet again. By the time he gets home, the image of bright eyes still linger in his mind and continue to haunt him until the day he dies.

 

 

●

 

 

There are times when Kasamatsu thinks Kise Ryouta is a big idiot, the biggest idiot of them all. Like that one time under the influence of heavy alcohol and poorly-made decisions in a gay bar they stumbled into one of the neighbourhood hotel rooms, liplocked and fingers fumbling to strip each other bare and feel the heat of their bodies flesh to flesh.

Kasamatsu thought the brat wouldn’t last an hour or two, but as per usual, Kise proves him wrong and absorbs him like a sponge and leaves him breathless until he’s begging for more, and to _fuck fuck fuck faster faster faster_ until he weeps in euphoria when he comes apart beautifully under strong arms.

They go slow after that, lips teasing salty skin and fingers mapping constellations on each other’s bodies. It’s amazing how complete Kasamatsu feels when Kise comes inside him, how electrifying it feels to have Kise’s erection grinding against him like wire plugs and sockets finally connected, and how wonderful everything feels when they collapse in a heap on soiled sheets in the aftermath.

That was amazing, is what Kasamatsu wants to say, but the words die on the tip of his tongue when he sees Kise’s sleeping face in front of him, eyebags terribly heavy and dark and just not-Kise in general.

He holds a funeral for the unspoken words left withering in his stomach the next morning when he awakens. Kise Ryouta is gone, Swiss watch and Armani slacks disappeared without a trace. Kasamatsu awkwardly checks out of the room after a long shower trying to scrub angry red blooms off his skin and realises that Kise was chivalrous enough to pay for their night, but no amount of money and words could symbolise the emptiness he feels in the wake of Kise Ryouta’s disappearance.

Maybe things were meant to be this way. Maybe they just weren’t meant to be. Maybe Kasamatsu is doomed to take care of six cats that come in the rainbow colour spectrum in his following reincarnation and die a lonely death in the next waiting for someone who would never come. In all his lives where they never meet, Kasamatsu never feels complete. The sense of restlessness gnaws at his bones and he is constantly plagued with dreams of a blond brat laughing, smiling at him and holding his hand.

It only feels right when he meets Kise Ryouta again, even though as mentor and mentee this time and nothing more. They remain as only friends even after high school because Kasamatsu is too much of a fucking chicken to confess his feelings, and Kise is too dense in this lifetime to notice anything except Aomine Daiki.

Kasamatsu never really clicked with that son of a bitch. He wouldn’t want to anyway after seeing him break Kise’s heart one time after another with his emo angsty sense of self importance. Kasamatsu is always there for Kise, swallowing the lump of sadness lodged in his throat and offering warm lemonade (and a few blunt words of wisdom) to the blond after his tenth breakup with the blunette because this is what love does to people. Kise can tell him to quit playing the guitar for his band on Friday nights and Kasamatsu would do it without hesitation. Kasamatsu cherishes his kouhai so much he’d fly to the moon sans oxygen tank just to see a smile light up the blond’s face.

So it comes as a surprise one afternoon when Kise sits him down in a tiny coffee shop and stares at him seriously. Their conversation of the day starts with the deafening sound of his heartbeat coming to an abrupt stop, followed by the inevitable cracking and eventually the crash of his heart onto the ground into pieces.

In the wake of the crash, Kise's voice is loud and clear. Kasamatsu can practically hear the hesitance and waiver quivering and manifesting itself into being when the blond says-

"Senpai, I'm getting married."

The world stops for one-tenth of a second, but in that time Kasamatsu's life flashes before his eyes. The moments fill his empty mind and cover up for the pitiful blank state it currently is stuck in.

"Senpai?" Kise is near hysterics now, "say something, please."

Kasamatsu forces a constipated smile on his lips as he pats his kouhai, the person he has secretly loved for years, on the shoulder and says–

"Congratulations, Kise."

–because that's the right thing to say, a pat in the shoulder is the right thing to do, but if so, then why does everything feel so wrong now?

"Are you okay, senpai?"

No. Kasamatsu is not okay. But he has to be. The imaginary confessions and picturesque scenes of How It Could Have Been can go fuck themselves for all he cares right now because fuck, the back of his eyeballs are starting to burn.

"Yeah, of course I'd be." he assures himself out loud, and part of him relaxes at the sight of Kise's shoulders slumping forward in relief.

"I'm just surprised someone would want to marry you." he adds for good measure, for safety.

"Senpai is still so mean!!"

So while Kise complains on about injustice and how Kasamatsu always seems to be the cause of it all, the latter sits there for another minute until his eyeballs really, really hurt and excuses himself for the day.

On the way home, he makes sure to stop by the convenience store and stock up on his dwindling supply of alcohol.

That night, the burning sensation of cheap sake running down his throat is not enough to drown his sorrows and tears, but it will have to do. He has to be strong for Kise, to be happy for Kise, especially on the wedding day itself when he stands by his kouhai’s side beside the altar as best man. Kise is relying on him to make things alright, and Kasamatsu cannot fail him.

“Take care of him for me, brat.” he punches Aomine Daiki in the arm after the procession. The latter’s cheeks colour a little before nodding curtly.

“Yeah, I will.”

“Stop breaking his heart, or one day I’ll break yours.”

Senpais should look out for their kouhais. So when Kise bounces towards him in tears and suffocates him with strong arms, Kasamatsu returns the hug and takes a whiff of that nice cherry blossom smell he always liked for the last time. When he lets Kise go, everything will be different. Kise will no longer be his and he’ll have to deal with the fact that the right side of the couch at home will always be empty from this instant.

_When you’re tired, come home_ is what Kasamatsu wants to tell Kise who is shedding snot and tears all over his wedding suit. But in the end, the words come out all garbled and they sound more of a _‘stop crying on your wedding day you idiot’_ instead of something heartwarming and nice.

On a comforting note, at least he still has the honour of sitting on the main table during the wedding dinner. Kise’s friends are quite amusing, their hairs come in all sorts of colours like a good packet of skittles and Kasamatsu can’t help but wonder if he’s seen them before somewhere somehow. They all remind him of cats that purr around people’s legs demanding for food, especially that purple-haired two-meter dude who munches on the appetizers even when the newlyweds are giving their heartfelt speeches.

“Something wrong?” a quiet voice pips from his right and Kasamatsu belatedly realises that Aomine Daiki’s best man Kuroko Tetsuya is talking to him.

Seriously though, no one ever has light blue hair, Kasamatsu must be imagining things. The alcohol must be getting to him.

“N-Nothing.” he mutters, “I just felt like I’ve seen you somewhere before.”

When Kuroko smiles, Kasamatsu feels an unpleasant chill race down his spine.

“They make a cute couple, don’t they?”

As he watches as the newlyweds lean in to kiss each other, he can’t help but wish that he was the one sitting beside Kise instead.

 

 

●

 

_I meant skies all empty aching blue._   
_I meant years._   
_I meant all of them with you._   
_–Kate Clanchy, Perhaps Patagonia_

 

●

 

 

But of course, they don’t always meet as naive young adults, fall stupidly in love and spend the rest of their lives together. Fate is not that kind to let happy endings come to play when her puppets have not gone through a multitude of hardships and buckets and buckets of tears.

They don’t cross paths for the next few millennia, because fate seems to have gotten sick of unrequited love as a recurring theme in the Kasamatsu/Kise dynamics. And when she comes up with something new, it seems to be the joke of the entire universe because one fine morning, where the sky is blue and fields are golden with ripening wheat, six-year-old Kasamatsu skips out of his house and finds an injured yellow canary lying on his doorstep.

God bless him.

But underneath that steely exterior, Kasamatsu has a heart made of liquid gold. He begs his mother to _please just let me heal the yellow birdie I promise to take good care of it!_ and the first thing the ingrate does when he wakes up is to shit on Kasamatsu’s bed while trying to fly with a broken wing.

Consequently, Kasamatsu grows ten shades of anger and frustration while learning to wash his own faeces-stained sheets and denies the yellow canary food and water for a day until the little shit starts making too much noise.

“Yukio-kun!” His mother reprimands him sternly when she notices the poor starving bird crying for help in a dark lonely corner of his room.

“It shat on my bed.”

Mrs Kasamatsu is unimpressed. “You promised to take care of it,” she says.

The cold war goes on a bit longer for another couple of hours, until Kasamatsu can’t find it in him to let an innocent life wither away like that. His heart is bigger than this. So, he speed-cycles down the street early next morning to buy top-grade bird seeds with his own pocket money and nurse the poor thing back to health for the following few months.

He remembers to put extra comfy cushions in the cage during winter, and makes sure that the heater is always working every single moment so poor Kise the Canary won’t die of frostbite. Mrs Kasamatsu comments how proud she is watching her little Yukio-kun grow up being responsible for another life, but Kasamatsu likes to think of it as caring for something because he likes? loves? it instead of caring for something with the intention of wanting to learn how to grow up.

He’s grown up well enough all right, and he’s had tons of fun watching Kise the Canary try to sing while he plays the ukelele on dry evenings in the front porch.

Come spring, Kise has to go. Kasamatsu is alone in the house when this happens. His parents have gone downtown, and the breeze is perfect for successful one-time take offs but the shittiest for tearful departures and sad goodbyes.

He places the cage on the gravel and opens the tiny cage gate. Kise hops onto his palm all too eagerly, excited at the prospect of being out in open air again. Kasamatsu prefers to think that Kise likes only him, thinks of only him as his one true friend because that one time when he brought Kise over to show off at his kindergarten and impress the girls, Kise refused to hop onto anybody else’s palm except his, refused to sing unless Kasamatsu was the one who told him to, and refused to stop pestering and poking Kuroko-sensei until Kasamatsu threatened to put his cage outside the classroom for the rest of the day.

“You’ve become part of the family, Kise.” Kasamatsu strokes the top of his head with a pudgy finger. The tiny bird chirps blissfully in response.

_But I guess, eventually, like everyone else, you have to leave me._

It hurts. Six-year-old Kasamatsu wouldn’t know heartbreak even if it announces itself in front of his eyes, but at that moment, his heart squeezes so tightly all the air in his lungs seem to have been sucked out of him forever. His companion is leaving, and Kasamatsu had always thought of himself as the canary’s home. To leave home is such a terrifying, heart-wrenching prospect Kasamatsu wishes Kise could stay with him and rely on him forever.

_It belongs to the wild, Yukio-kun, you can’t possible expect the poor bird to be caged up all day long at home, can you?_

“I’ll miss you,” he chokes on his tears.

Kise only stares at him with curious, beady eyes.

The freest of spirits cannot be domesticated. They go wherever the wind blows, so Kasamatsu lifts his hands into the air and lets the wind take Kise wherever it’ll go. Kise flies back once or twice to perch on his shoulder and peck his cheek affectionately, wanting to stay but after another few tries Kasamatsu is left standing alone in the front porch with an empty cage, staring at the sky even though Kise had left two hours ago.

The tears don’t stop pouring down his face. He cries alone in bed that night after refusing dinner, and sometimes, amidst his sobs and hiccups, he can still hear the ghost of Kise chirping in the background, demanding to be fed or attended to.

“Oh Yuki-kun,” his mother holds him in her arms the next morning, kissing his puffy lids and tear-streaked cheeks, “if it makes you feel any better, we’ll buy another canary from the petshop?”

But it’s not the same. It will never be the same. Kise is irreplaceable because even before Kasamatsu met the yellow canary, Kise already had a place in his heart. All Kise did was just fly into the nest made for him in his heart and completed the puzzle picture Kasamatsu had been trying to solve since he was born. His mother doesn’t get it, and if Kasamatsu were being honest with himself, he thinks he probably doesn’t too.

 

 

●

 

 

“Oh, it’s you again.” is the first thing that slips out of Kasamatsu’s tongue when they meet again centuries later.

And it’s funny because this time, after a series of reincarnations spent as arch-enemies tasked to blow each other to bits, they wind up in high school of all places to go. Here, he is captain of the basketball club and Kise is a bumbling, self-centered freshman brat who is ten times better than all of the club combined in terms of strength and skills.

In response, both of them blink until Kise stutters, “h-have I seen you before?”

“N-No, I was mistaken, sorry. My bad, freshman.” Kasamatsu wants to kill himself. Deja vu can go jump off a cliff when he’s done drowning himself in embarrassment.

“Maybe you’ve seen me in posters! Or magazines! After all, I am a model and distributing my face on paper is what I live for!!”

Obnoxious brat. Kasamatsu takes it upon himself to slap some sense of respect and discipline into the idiot from that moment onwards, physically if he has to.

But Kise endures it all admirably, even when Kasamatsu threatens grievous bodily harm on him after taking the train two hours away from home to drag the brat away from Seirin so Kaijou can resume practice as usual. Perhaps it’s how fate makes it up to him for making his past lives that were shitty enough to span ten seasons of batshit emo Evangelion-esque anime.

“Senpaaaaaiii!” Kise whines as they leave behind a frowning Kagami and impassive Kuroko _(Kurokocchiiiiiii why won’t you wave at meeeee?????)_ at the front gates. Damn the phantom sixth player and his creepy stares, Kasamatsu swears he must’ve offended him somehow in his past life.

“Shut up. Freshmen have no right to talk to their seniors like that. What are you, six?” Kasamatsu smacks the blond silly while dragging him onto the train home. Jesus, just how much of his heart is still with Teikou? He tries to calculate the amount of time and exposure needed to get rid of the Teikou ghost residing in Kise’s heart and realises that even all of Kaijou’s regulars’ fingers combined are not enough to make Kise stay.

He looks up at the blond from his seat who continues to sulk like the brat he is, and feels a sudden pang of guilt and sadness slash across his heart. Kaijou is not enough for Kise, rising star of high school basketball league and ex-member of Teikou’s infamous Generation of Miracles, and in more ways than one Kasamatsu feels like he’s failed as captain, as someone part of Kise’s life to make the latter happy and find reasons for him to stay.

Kaijou is not enough. Kasamatsu is not enough. It’s depressing.

“Senpai?”

“What.”

Kise fidgets in his seat and shoots the older boy a nervous glance.

“Nothing,” he says, “you just looked very sad.”

“I’m not. Why the hell would I be?”

But Kise says nothing else and rests his weight on Kasamatsu, and the latter can feel the way Kise’s body moves each time he inhales. His mind works to remember the rhythm of Kise’s breathing, the touch and pressure of Kise’s arm against his, and from the reflection across the opposite window pane Kasamatsu sees how serene Kise looks as he leans against him, pouring peace and faith between their folds and cracks and melding them into one.

“Kise.”

“Just let me lean on you this once senpai, please?”

And that was the biggest lie of all. In this life (and beyond), Kise leans on him more than once. Kasamatsu is there to light him back when he burns out after busting a knee, he is there to clean Kise up when his kouhai got wasted at a party, offering shitty advice amidst wails and cries of heartbreak; he puts in so much effort to lift Kise up to greater heights and support them both that even Moriyama, best friend since they were in diapers, complains about how Kasamatsu never helps him with homework when the womanizer desperately needs it for college entrance exams.

But Kasamatsu only shrugs it off and continues photocopying his dusty old freshman-year notes for a failing Kise so the brat can secure his position as a regular on the team. The urge to take care of the overgrown human puppy is much too overwhelming sometimes.

“He ogles at you with those puppy eyes like you’re god, and you still indulge him even though you hate his pouts! Ah, the essence of true love!”

“You’ll shut up this instant if you know what’s good for your manhood.”

“Maybe you two are soulmates! Destinies entwined and brought together by the red string of fate!”

“Yoshitaka.”

“Yes Yuki-chan?”

“Die.”

They never make it past high school graduation in that life. Kise kisses him once under the sakura tree behind the school the day before Kasamatsu graduates, but that was it. Beyond a soft touch of lips and heavy hearts, Kise stands by the window in his class alone the next day and watches Kasamatsu leave, out of school grounds and out of his life altogether.

Despite having an extra hundred and eighty-nine centimeters of height and weight off his shoulders, Kasamatsu’s heart feels heavier than ever. It sinks in despair and drags him down like an anchor in the sea until he forgets what it’s like to breathe properly again.

 

 

●

 

 

Stupid Kise gives him a hard time after that.

Correction, stupid Kise _and Fate_ give him a hard time after that.

In a world where Kise is a junior model struggling to fit himself on the high ranks of the supermodel status quo and adjust his Japanese ass to Americano, Kasamatsu serves as his manager, and nothing ever goes right but wrong instead.

Also, Kasamatsu gets reincarnated as a girl. A fucking girl. With Boobs and Periods and the Ability to Host Parasitic Babies in a Vagina. The worst joke of the millennia ever since the Canary Incident. Apparently god forgot about her manly endowments, left her dick in the human factory and blessed her with tits and a pouty butt, progesterone and oestrogen plenty in abundance as compensation.

And she gets stuck with Kise for more than five fucking years, where she meets him in the HR office of the modelling agency from day one until the day he walks out of her apartment and never comes back. She is there, holding his head as he vomits into the toilet bowl in the aftermath of the Givenchy Fall 2014 afterparty. She props him up by the shoulders, dumps him on her couch and serves him warm lemonade when he groans in pain. And when he is slumped over the kitchen table, her credit card gleaming in the morning sunlight beside tiny anthills of fine white powder, all she does is sigh, dispose the nasty shit down the sink and wake him up to take him out to breakfast.

“Why are you doing this to yourself, Kise?” she asks quietly as he plays around with the croutons in his caesar salad.

Kise only shrugs in response, defeated look momentarily crossing his face before it disappears into a black hole inside of him and never resurfaces again.

She tries quitting, tries leaving behind a life full of late nights trying to find boneheaded blonds in dark disco parties and move on to a better working environment. But the apartment feels all too empty without another hundred and eighty-nine centimeters to fill the void. The bills decrease in dollars but the emptiness increases in mass. An inversely proportional graph re-charts her life and throws normalcy and routine out of the window.

On the night that marks her 47th day Kasamatsu quit her job, she finds herself standing on the Brooklyn Bridge five minutes after a quiet, solemn call.

_“_ _Yukicchi.”_ The static croaks, thick with emotion.

And there, as she coaxes Kise down from the railings and into her arms, Kasamatsu knows she can’t leave him alone.

They make love in her apartment that night. She knows he fucks that stupid basketball star Aomine Daiki sometimes, and hangs around with that insane redhead Akashi Seijuurou and his creepy assistant Kuroko Tetsuya too much, but she’s in too deep to stay afloat beneath Kise’s personal affairs. No matter how much, how far Kasamatsu runs, Kise always comes back, sometimes shivering with insecurity and sometimes filled with blinding happiness to the brim, and Kasamatsu always welcomes him with open arms to shield him from the cold and keep him warm.

“I love you.” Kise breathes into her after hours of heavy duty make-out sessions in the darkness of the bedroom.

There are so many things that feel wrong at the present, like the rough, uncomfortable feel of the sheets against her bare back, or the way Kise’s eyes are still filled with a magnitude of sadness of 10.0, but at the same time there are so many things that feel right.

The softness of his touch.

The pressure of his palms enveloping her wrists pinned to the sides of her head.

His skin against hers.

(Them.)

It feels like they’ve done this so many times in the past, so Kasamatsu swallows the uncomfortable lump stuck in her throat, reaches out to meet him halfway and lets him in.

 

 

●

 

 

He figures it out halfway through their 17th life together.

Sitting down in front of Moriyama (who somehow never fails to be his best friend each passing life), he demands a fortune telling session on the tragic outlook of his love life after his break up with playboy Kise Ryouta. The bastard agrees only after Kasamatsu relents on a three-day trip to Tokyo so they can ogle at girls.

So much time has been lost on deciphering the intent and meaning behind hidden feelings and fateful encounters that Kasamatsu realises, with much horror, there probably isn't much time left.

They've chased after each other for seventeen lives. and as Moriyama Yoshitaka, romance expert trained in the art of Tengenjutsu, dishes out tarot cards for a simple basic reading, Kasamatsu realises that he's got to find Kise and make him remember so that this will stop, so that they can rest in peace the next time they die and not be reborn as strangers again.

Their 18th reincarnation flies past and their 19th, 20th, _21st_ come and go. Ironically enough, Kise turns into cupid in one of their lives and has to help Kasamatsu score a date with that loser Moriyama Yoshitaka who only has eyes for pretty girls with milky white thighs. Kasamatsu doesn’t even know why cupid Kise is so hellbent on pairing him up with someone as straight as a rod. He secretly suspects Kise of being a fake because sweet jesus how can cupid (ambassador of _love and romance_ ) not see true love in the eye?

“We’ll review Plan E and improvise,” Cupid Kise speaks with his mouth full of soggy, half-digested potato chips after a failed attempt at snagging Moriyama to the Winter Ball. Kise’s plans suck, they never work, but Kasamatsu loves him enough to put up with it so Kise can be happy for a while even if it means putting his own pride and dignity on the line for immeasurable moments of joy. Seeing Kise’s face light up with excitement and hope is enough for him to buy ugly cacti that prick people to death instead of red roses for Moriyama on Valentine’s Day.

Also, it saves Kise from being fired of his job. Win-win situation. Well, sort of.

“Can’t we just give it a rest? What if I don’t like him? What if I like someone else?”

Kise stops mid-chew. “Are you telling me that cupid’s judgment, _cupid’s arrow of love_ is wrong?”

“Yes.” Kasamatsu stares at him head on. Maybe Kise shot the wrong person in the heart. God knows the bumbling idiot is capable of such things that seem to screw up every single poor unfortunate soul’s life.

Kise’s face crumples into the wrinkliest, most crumpled ball of paper Kasamatsu has ever seen. There is imperfection hidden behind that facade, and Kasamatsu wants to tear that mask down and see it for himself.

“Please fall in love with Mr I-Like-Girls,” Kise almost begs, “I need this job.” Now Kasamatsu feels like a grade A jerk for even suggesting a change of plans in the first place.

Every single love tactic fails. In the end, Moriyama marries a french girl whose name Kasamatsu cannot even for the life of pi remember, much less pronounce. But at least somebody’s dreams came true and happiness was found amidst the sour taste of defeat and heartbreak. On the day Kise packs his bags to fly away and leave, Kasamatsu remembers life ten thousand years ago and beyond, back to a time when they still pointed guns at each other and he died at the hands of double agent Kise Ryouta, and he picks up the courage to test the currents of dark waters because he thinks there is simply nothing more to lose.

_How many times have you shot me in the heart and gotten away with it?_

“Have you ever remembered playing basketball, Kise?” he asks, perched on the other end of the bed as Kise dumps his designer-brand clothes (half of which Kasamatsu paid for) into a black, pitless Mary Poppins-esque suitcase.

“No. Never even thought of it. It makes me sweaty and extremely unglam. I hate it.”

Oh well, it was worth a try.

And when Kise stands by the front door to bid his goodbyes, Kasamatsu pulls him into a hug and watches apprehensively as Kise stares back at him with shock. Riding the tides of courage and excitement, he takes cupid’s hands into his and looks at him in the eye.

“Kasamatsucchi?”

“Have you–” Kasamatsu pauses, suddenly nervous, “–have you ever thought about staying? Just the two of us.” _Together._

It takes Kise a minute or two before his face finally dawns with realisation, before he finally gets it.

“Oh Kasamatsucchi…” He smiles sadly, hugs a heartbroken Kasamatsu Yukio who bravely displays his best ‘it’s okay’ smile, before spreading his wings to fly away.

_I_ _’m sorry, but I can’t._ We _can’t._

In this life, it is not enough. Again. Like the days when Kise leaves Kaijou for Seirin, or even Touou. Kasamatsu is not enough.

As he sits on the couch and watches his broken heart roll miserably by his feet on the floor, Kasamatsu wonders just when exactly he will be, whether he will ever be.

 

 

●

 

 

It’s like being lost in the train interchange station during the Japanese Lunch Rush Hour, waiting to board the right train home but not knowing which one it is.

The crowd would be his emotions, people from all walks of life brushing past him would equate the overwhelming number of emotions bombarding him and taking over his world by storm. And to find this one person, this one idiotic blond whom he loves very much in millions of people coming and going and changing every single second, Kasamatsu’s not sure how long he can continue going on.

How do you search for someone who is lost? How do you search for someone when _you_ are lost?

“We used to stay back for extra basketball practice in Kaijou, just the two of us.” He murmurs as he takes a seat by the hospital ward.

In this life, he plays the role of a social worker waiting for Kise’s return to the human realm after a very long journey of wandering around in heaven. He brushes blond bangs aside so more sunlight can shine pale ashy skin back to a healthier colour.

It is his seventy-fourth day visiting a comatose Kise Ryouta. Everyday Kasamatsu brings new stories to the ward, and he can keep on going forever even though he only remembers a fraction of what they’ve gone through, but it would be meaningless then. There is no joy in spending time talking to someone you love who won’t respond back. Chopsticks come in pairs, so do hands, because there is strength in numbers. It takes two to love and build a steady relationship that will last even after the end of time.

“Come back, Kise,” Kasamatsu Yukio chokes quietly on his tears and memories. Without Kise, it has become a burden to shoulder these memories alone. “Please, come back home.”

 

 

●

 

_Let my hands guide you,_   
_they know how to take you home._   
_–Tyler Knott Gregson_

 

●

 

 

After an insane number of lifetimes running after different Kise Ryoutas, Kasamatsu is sick of this thing, this whole cat-and-mouse chase that only seems to be terribly one sided because every single goddamn time he sees the dumb blond, he is always off frolicking with other people. It may be an oxymoron to say that despite different Kise Ryoutas, the same Kise Ryouta that Kasamatsu fell in love with eons ago is still somewhere there residing in its owner’s beating heart, but it’s the ultimate truth, one that Kasamatsu cannot run away from.

With each passing life it only gets harder and harder to approach Kise and even when Kasamatsu manages to, the puzzled, slightly freaked out look is enough to send the raven-haired boy’s pitiful self back into the land of broken hearted and damned.

"Don't you remember? Kaijou, basketball, generation of miracles?" his eyebrows scrunch up as Kise frowns, taking a hesitant step back.

"I'm sorry, do I know you?"

Fate. It's stupid. It's a bitch. Kasamatsu wants to call it quits, he's too tired to keep this up. Fuck stupid red threads, they’re just nothing but cotton.

He meets the manifestation of fate in this realm in a quiet cafe on a Sunday afternoon.

It's kind of weird, because in all his lives he can remember that pale blue haired shortstuff was always there, and with this revelation everything falls into place.

Taking a deep breath, he approaches the midget and says hi. What could go wrong? He's been rejected and shunned by Kise Ryouta for god knows how many lives he's lived, and the brand of "idiot/creep" has been stamped across his forehead for as long as he can remember ever since he dedicated his life to lunacy and questionable theories about soulmates and shit.

“Hi."

"Hello, Kasamatsu-kun."

Bingo. Jackpot. He takes a seat without being asked to. It’s rude, but Kasamatsu supposes he can afford to act this way, he isn’t senpai for nothing.

"You must be fate."

"My name is Kuroko Tetsuya."

"I want out. Stop this now. It's sickening."

"You can't. It's a cycle, you'll have to wait until time runs out."

"Can't all this just–" Kasamatsu raises his hand to slam it against the table, but in the end he concedes defeat and lowers his arm. He's so tired he doesn't know what to do anymore.

"Why him?" is all he asks, burying his face in his hands.

"I don't know."

"You must have answers, you're fate."

"You're chained, connected, Kise Ryouta may not remember so that's why it's your job to remind him so you can be together again." Kuroko continues to sip on those stupid vanilla milkshakes he likes so much as he sprouts stupid love-booth pamphlet bullshit on Kasamatsu’s face.

"This is stupid. Can’t I just give up? Wave some stupid white flag? Rot in hell?" It's not like the apocalypse would happen, right? Kise can still go on being a brat, changing lovers over and over again, and Kasamatsu can finally rest in peace and move on and if he gets his way, stop reincarnating and finally die once and for all.

"You can't, you won't allow it yourself. You love him too much to let him go."

"What the fuck."

"Because you are home, Kasamatsu-kun, you’re Kise’s home.” Kuroko's voice is firm and it makes him look up for a moment to meet blue eyes.

“I am made of bricks? I have a chimney on my roof? _I have a roof?????_ ”

Vanilla milkshakes be damned. Kuroko rolls his eyes in a very Kuroko way and sighs in exasperation.

“Kise’s been finding for a place of his own for a long time. Haven’t you realised how empty and cold you felt whenever he wasn’t there? It’s the same for him too, every home needs someone to light the fireplace, to keep it warm, and every person needs a home to live in. All this time, he’s been searching for you, and you him. This will go on and on forever unless you stop it. The ball's in your court now, so take your chances and keep trying to reach him."

Kasamatsu chokes on the sourness swelling in his throat. It constricts his chest until he has to close his eyes to relieve the pain, but it makes it all worse because behind closed eyelids, all he can see is blond hair, honey gold eyes and the continuous chimes of _'senpai senpai senpai'_ ringing in his ears.

A distant memory, but one that remains throughout their entire multitude of reincarnations and soap opera love stories nonetheless.

"Can't you help me?" he sighs in defeat.

Outside, the wind blows. When this meeting ends, he will have to brave the cold alone once again.

Kuroko grimaces. "I'm sorry, I can only do what I can."

 

 

●

 

 

They fall in love next time. Maybe this time Kuroko really is helping them behind the scenes, and Kasamatsu thinks, so full of hope, that maybe this is the one, the one lifetime where they get married and grow old and die together and move on to the afterlife together, the only one that hasn’t happened in their permutations of reincarnations and rebirths.

But one day when he accidentally gets hit by a truck, almost dies but is brought back to life by a time leaping Kise who went back in time to alter the past, the hope that seems to burst at the seams disappears with an inaudible pop. The colourful, bright world dims and fades to black in four seconds flat.

“I am not from this world, senpai.” Kise confesses when Kasamatsu confronts him in a mass of static humans trapped in time. They’re back at the crime scene itself where Kasamatsu once died in another different time frame. “I’ll have to leave one day, to go back. And tomorrow is the day I have to go. I broke the rule, they’re coming for me.”

“Kise–”

“It’s nice to have met you, it’s nice to have played basketball with you. Ever since meeting you, I have never felt happier than I could be–”

“Shut the fuck up.”

The crowd is too much. Even in static, all things stopped in place, Kasamatsu’s life is spiralling out of control like the electromagnetic spectrum travelling at the speed of light, plummeting down Everest with an abysmal amount insanity. Suddenly, things are spinning out out _out_ of control and there is no way to pull the brakes and brace himself for the impending crash. Kise has melded into the sea of human statues and is nowhere to be found.

“Kise?” he yells, desperate, “Kise!”

“Senpai–”

An arm rises from the street across him. Kasamatsu races towards it. There are no trucks to kill him this time.

“–I’ll never forget you.”

And then, just like that, time springs back into action and brings everything back to life. By the time Kasamatsu fights his way through the bustling Tokyo lunch hour crowd to cross the street, Kise is already gone.

He exchanges everything he has for the ability to leap through time. Belatedly, he realises he should have left a note for his parents, should have been a better son, should have saved more money so he can afford to spend more in alternate universes. But it’s too late now. He is off on a personal mission to cut through time and space. _Time leapers,_ Moriyama shakes his head, closes his eyes in defeat and stamps the brand across Kasamatsu’s wrist. They are best friends again in this world, Kasamatsu cannot be any more grateful.

He will find Kise, and they will be together. He will not pass up this chance just because the universe is against them. Their love is greater than that, an eon of rebirths and persistence has proven so. Kasamatsu will not give up, not when Kise is waiting for him, trying his very own best and relying on him to make things right again.

“You only have 25 days in one dimension, one time plane. You’ll die if you exceed the limit.” Moriyama reminds him as Kasamatsu stands on the cliff and prepares to leap.

“You can only leap 25 times.” Kasamatsu nods, aware of his own predicament.

“You enrolled yourself on a suicide mission.” Suicide missions are aplenty, Kasamatsu cannot recount the number of times he was assigned to kill Kise Ryouta in multiple assassination attempts and died willingly at the latter’s hands. Two sets of fingers are simply not enough.

_“You will die.”_

“I know, Yoshi.” he closes his eyes and imagines honey golden eyes crinkling at the sight of him. ”Thanks a lot, buddy, for everything.” And he never looks back as he takes that leap of faith, propels forward and accelerates towards the ground and disappears into an alternate world in hopes that all his luck will send him flying to Kise so they can see each other again.

But Kasamatsu’s body cannot take traveling through dimensions and time for too long. Around the 14th time, he starts vomiting out of nausea and has to stay bedridden for a day or two before he can move around to continue searching for the boneheaded blond. And by the 20th time, he feels even weaker than ever and productivity starts hitting an all time low, not that his search was very productive to begin with anyway.

He finds himself in a dilemma because he knows he shouldn’t stay for long when he cannot find Kise in the current dimension, but he’s afraid that if he doesn’t stay till his full extent he might miss the blond who might have just entered the dimension. But the longer he stays, the further he is left behind. Kise is advancing, travelling through time to different dimensions, and if Kasamatsu doesn’t catch up he might just lose Kise forever.

In the middle, near the climax of their love story in this universe, they finally meet each other again by chance and probability supported by thin hope. But Kise doesn’t stay for long – he can’t. It is his punishment for breaking the rule of saving someone’s life by turning back time so he cannot stay in a dimension for more than 7 days, 18 days lesser than a normal time leaper’s like Kasamatsu. And when Kasamatsu finally bumps into him, it is Kise’s 7th day, _last day_ in that world.

“No.” Kise watches in horror and disbelief when Kasamatsu slides his wristguard up and reveals the number of chances he has left to leap through time. Kasamatsu’s days are numbered and it’s because of him. It's all his fault. The effect of this thought is too heavy, too much to bear.

Instead of yelling at him in a very Kasamatsu-like manner when Kise stands in front of him at a loss for words, all the older boy says is a soft _“don’t cry”_ and wipes away his beloved kouhai’s tears with warm hands.

“You’re always like that,” Kasamatsu continues and laces their fingers together, “running off doing things I never wanted you to do. Like saving my life and leaving me alone after confessing.”

“I’m sorry,” Kise weeps brokenly and openly. “I’m sorry, senpai.”

Kise is still the crybaby he knows. It’s comforting to know that some things haven’t changed, like how he needs to be placated with hugs and assured of promises sealed with kisses. So, Kasamatsu tip toes (damn, fate could stand to give him a few more centimeters after all this while) and reaches forward to press their lips together.

Yearning, they call it. It’s been lightyears, ages, _eons._

They will be all right. Things will be right. Kise holds him like he is broken, fragile china, but these cracks in him have sustained more than just sorrow and regret. They’ve pulled the both of them through hard times of unrequited love, and they’ve held them together when each experienced loss and separation too heavy to bear in all their numerous rebirths.

_I am home,_ Kasamatsu whispers through the tender brush of their lips, and Kise responds instantly.

_I am home._

The same thing, but two different meanings. Just like them. Two seemingly different people in different lives, but ultimately the same old people on opposite ends of the spectrum coming together as one.

This time, Kise is the one to make the promise. He gazes at Kasamatsu with such fiery determination before he has to go and Kasamatsu tears up a little because this time, after all those years he will finally be the one relying on Kise. He will no longer be alone.

“We’ll be together again. I swear senpai, we will.”

“I’ll find you. I’ll keep on searching until I find you again.”

Kise doesn’t say anything else and smiles, his face still streaked with tears. When very last of the current has swept him away, all that’s left in his spot are teardrops marked onto the gravel, the faint scent of cherry blossom fragrance present in all his lives and the touch that still lingers on Kasamatsu’s lips as proof that he once existed in this time plane.

For the first time he can remember, Kasamatsu dies in this life with no regrets.

 

 

●

 

 

The last time Kasamatsu ever remembers whichever life he is born into, he gives up.

No, he doesn't give up on finding Kise, but he gives up on trying to force his way through and shock the brat back to memories of millennia ago where they loved each other.

This time, Kasamatsu waits.

It's Sunday, nice blue sky, perfect day to go outside and breathe in fresh air. After putting on his newly-acquired Adidas Adizero Bash, he makes his way down his apartment and wanders aimlessly around the neighbourhood. He splurges on transportation fees and takes random trains to everywhere, until he winds up in Shinjuku where everything began.

When he finds an empty seat in one of those rare al fresco cafes by the sidewalk, Kasamatsu sits and waits for nothing and everything to happen.

And it does, it happens. The rest is history.

He is busy drifting off into space looking at cottony clouds in frightening blue skies when a shadow falls across his face. Blond strands of hair catch his attention and the voice that follows is unmistakably him. He smells exactly the same - faint cherry blossom shower foam with a hint of lavender moisturizer.

"Senpai?"

Kasamatsu wants to cry, he also wants to sock the brat in the gut and disfigure his handsome face. Instead, he finally pushes the corners of his lips upwards and chokes out a greeting.

"Took you long enough, brat."

When he looks in front, Kise Ryouta stands in front of him in his all 6'1 modeling glory, like it's socially acceptable of one to be fashionably late for a meeting fate planned for them since the start of time.

This time, they both remember.

"I missed you, senpai."

"Likewise, Kise. Likewise."

And as Kise takes a seat beside him and tangles their fingers together, Kasamatsu tightens his grip and doesn't let go. He doesn't know a lot of things, but he does know this – in all their different lives, they will always gravitate back to each other. Remembered or not, they will always cross paths, and they will always find their way back to each other even when time runs out and a new start begins.

This is their love, it spans eons across the never-ending universe and settles only when their hearts find one another, beating and breathing life into two empty vessels that only live when their paths intersect. This is only the beginning. Every end of each world marks the beginning of another, every death marks rebirth, and every dying amber sparkles new hope so they will continue to love.

This is them.

Together.

Always, and forever.

 

 

●

 

_I love our love story… the ups, the downs, the twists and turns, the love that keeps us together through it all. And I love looking back to the day we met, remembering all the sweet moments that are forever in my heart. I love knowing that time has made us stronger and brought us even closer. And when I think of tomorrow, wondering what our love story will hold, I know it will be wonderful, for I will be sharing it with you._

 

●

 

 

The wedding takes place a year later. Kasamatsu stands by the altar waiting, but this time it's different. It's a different sort of waiting, the sort that feeds your stomach kung-fu butterflies that dropkick the lining and threaten to fly out of your trachea.

When Pachelbel’s Canon in D starts playing, the church door opens and Kise walks in with Kuroko by his side.

He is so stunningly handsome.

From the door, where the sunlight pours in and casts a nice glow on his entire being, Kise grins embarrassedly, scratching his hair and Kasamatsu has the urge to just skip everything, walk down the aisle to him and cart him off to their honeymoon destination.

He wants to elope god damn it, end everything in spunk and style, but what would poor Momoi say?

So he waits. It's okay, this time everything is right, everything is perfect, the puzzle pieces have fallen into place and the picture is complete. Moriyama Yoshitaka stands by his side as best man and Aomine Daiki sits among the guests grinning happily for them. Kasamatsu stands tall and firm in his place and tries not to let snot and tears decorate his face on this beautiful, fateful day that will finally put everything to an end so they can begin their new life together.

Kise is coming.

And he is here.

**Author's Note:**

> the last two lines are taken from the ending of The Time Traveller's Wife ;; i just really liked the ending sobs. i can't seem to find the true source for my last quote so if anyone knows pls do let me know!!
> 
> critique is very much appreciated! thank you for reading!


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